Although programmer John Carmack is famous for his work on some of the most technologically advanced games of the past few decades, it appears to have been a growing lack of interest in this same field that ultimately led to his departure from id Software after 22 years.

A recent interview with USA Today revealed it was primarily Carmack's interest in the virtual reality and the unwillingness of id's publisher to embrace such technology that resulted in the split.

As both the chief technological officer at Oculus VR and an employee at id, Carmack had hoped that publisher ZeniMax would agree to allow upcoming games such as "Wolfenstein: The New Order" and "Doom 4" to be tailored for the Oculus Rift Headset. Unfortunately for id, ZeniMax had other plans.

"When it became clear that I wasn't going to have the opportunity to do any work on VR while at id software, I decided to not renew my contract," Carmack said.

Carmack, however, was in no hurry to leave id. "I would have been content probably staying there working with the people and technology that I know and the work we were doing," he added.

Although he describes leaving id as "bittersweet," his new project appears to be a source of creative stimulation for the programmer. When it comes to games "we have all the performance we ever dreamed about and then some," Carmack said, but he also noted that he believes VR has the potential to be as revolutionary as the transition from 2D to 3D gaming.